The Bearings, Vol 7, No 2
Articles in this issue
- Report on an informal Illinois Division L.A.W. legislative meeting at the Loland Hotel, Chicago, where twenty-four members unanimously passed resolutions opposing the proposed class B amateur system, called for strict amateur rules and Racing Board suspensions on suspicion, and discussed relay rides from Springfield to neighboring state capitals planned by vice consul A.A. Billingsley with Governor Altgeld's support.
- The Illinois Cycling Club plans an open amateur road race as a Decoration Day contingency if the Pullman race is abandoned, routing a sixteen-mile course from the club house at 1068 Washington Boulevard to Oak Park and Riverside; West Side park commissioners are also considering extending Washington Boulevard to Elmhurst to improve road cycling in the region.
- The Savannah Wheelmen's Track Association will stage twenty bicycle races over February 22–23 on their new quarter-mile cement track costing $10,000, with prizes including diamond cuff buttons, a fine clock, and gold medals; a Bearings editorial note questions whether the one-foot-in-five banking is steep enough for full-speed turns.
- The Bearings reaffirms its role as a medium between manufacturer, dealer, and rider, and lists twelve editorial scoops in its February 3 issue that its local competitor lacked, including stories on A.G. Spalding's cash prize views, the arrest of the New York Division secretary-treasurer, and the history of the Coventry Machinists' Co.
- An editorial urges the Associated Cycling Clubs of Chicago, New York, and Philadelphia to use their collective voting power in upcoming municipal elections, criticizing Chicago's political action committee for failing to co-operate with a newspaper's street-cleaning campaign or investigate the city's shrunken street-cleaning budget.
- Chief Consul Henry E. Harris of the Kansas Division argues in a letter from Fort Scott that the proposed two-class amateur rule bars class A riders from competing in L.A.W. championships against class B entrants without losing their class A status, and proposes an amendment allowing cross-class championship competition.
- Chief Consul A.B. Choate of Minnesota recounts how he organized the state's good roads convention openly as an L.A.W. official, was unanimously elected president of the new permanent association, and watched the Minneapolis Board of Trade suffer press ridicule for dismissing the road movement as serving 'them bicycle fellers.'
- Clippings from the English weekly Wheeling warn the international championship scheme will fail without France; a Des Moines Argonaut excerpt denounces the Bicycling World organ for omitting applicants' addresses; Boston, Kansas City, and Pittsburg papers debate Col. Pope's proposed asphalt road from New York to Chicago.
- Correspondent 'Bolav' describes central and western Pennsylvania as a naturally rich but road-blighted region where he witnesses Pullman coaches fall from a bridge and blood-soaked stretchers carried through a station, arguing that wretched highways have impoverished and isolated the population for over a century.
- An unsigned comic profile of the treasurer of Union Cycle Mfg. Co. recounts how he and two fellow Bostonians, caught without wind in the dangerous tidal currents at Wood's Hole, stripped and swam to haul their catboat through a rock cleft—attracting a paying sightseeing crowd on a passing Nantucket steamer.
- Reports on the spread of bicycle corps through the National Guard: Connecticut's first regiment is well-drilled, a Washington D.C. cavalry bicycle unit is forming with light rifles and signal flags, Maryland's application is stalled on Guard strength limits, and California is proposing a bicycle battalion, while the Duke of Connaught has praised British cyclist scouts after Isle of Wight manoeuvres.
- Miscellaneous notes: twenty former Detroit Wheelmen form the Cadillac Wheel Club with a 20-spoked sprocket emblem; Princeton College bars students from outside athletic clubs, affecting cyclist George A. Banker; the Tourist Wheelmen of Omaha held a successful January reception; John A. Pallister of Ottumwa, Iowa completed a New Year's Day century despite snow drifts.
- New York city letter: Zimmerman refuses to discuss cash prizes; William Windle, looking well but stout, is strongly opposed to cash prizes and will ride in class B; Casper Whitney's Harper's Weekly tirade against the Racing Board stirs debate; the financially troubled Manhattan Athletic Club is expected to withdraw from the cycle path entirely this season.
- Chicago city letter notes cyclists braving icy boulevards while pedestrians slip; the Cook County Wheelmen have signed a lease on a $50,000 club house to open May 1; the Lincoln Cycling Club displays a four-ounce cherry-wood pipe from England brought by A.J. Marrett; the Walter Emerson Concert Co. will perform at Rosalie Hall on February 15 under Chicago C.C. auspices.
- T.A. Edge, editor of British Sport and Land's End record-holder, recounts how he sprinted past a visibly flagging Holbein in the final three minutes of the 1890 North Road 24-hour race near Biggleswade, only to discover he had been turned short on a miscalculated extra loop, costing him what would have been an upset victory.
- Technical instructions from a Toledo correspondent for truing a bicycle frame using a straight-edge: check chain sprocket alignment, spring rear tubes if needed, then spring the head and fork until the front wheel is central and the rider can steer hands-off, with notes on filing axle slots to correct lateral wheel hang.
- Report on aggressive discounting at the Philadelphia Cycle Show, where representatives secretly compiled each other's discount lists—some offering 40 percent plus two percent cash on fifty-wheel orders—and the Stokes Company's financial man argues that country trade loyalty to established high-grade wheels will keep list prices firm.
- The Bearings exclusively reports that the American Cycle Co.'s Jackson Street plant—successor to the Chicago Bicycle Co. founded by the Worth brothers in Cedar Rapids in 1890—has been sold for $100,000 to Pittsburg investors headed by H.D. Squires of the Pittsburg Cycle Co., who plan to build the American Convertible tandem, American Lady, and a new 26-pound American Raleigh.
- Profile of Philip Goetz, treasurer and de facto general financier of the Stokes Mfg. Co., Chicago, described as a methodical, plain-spoken man who works by the clock, devises printed order forms to accelerate shipment, and believes quiet system beats 'inspired brilliancy.'
- Chief Willard A. Smith of the World's Fair Transportation Department has issued space certificates to about 80 American and 15 English cycle exhibitors for the Columbian Exposition, with Pope, Gormully & Jeffery, Monarch, Raleigh, and Coventry Machinists' among those confirmed; the Bearings profiles Smith, vehicle superintendent A.A. Abbott, and private secretary Bessie B. Boyer.
- The Bearings breaks the story of a secret February 7 meeting of Chicago cycle dealers at the Pope Mfg. Co. offices, called by A.G. Spalding & Bros. and Pope; attendees resolved not to deviate from published list prices on wheels at $135 and over, and formed the Cycle Trade Association with C.F. Stokes as president and F.L. Douglas as secretary.
- Fort Worth salesman J. Elmer Pratt argues that fewer than five percent of cycle agencies are fit for a lady to visit, calling for clean display floors, polished machines in even rows, trimmed windows, filed invoices, and managers who greet customers at the door with cheerful knowledge of stock and prices.
- Chicago trade column: the Stover Bicycle Mfg. Co. takes over 285 Wabash Avenue as its Chicago branch; R.M. Barwise of Stokes Co. patents a center-brace pump; L.W. Conkling closes a Swift agency for Missouri with Jordan & Sanders; Phelps & Dingle confirm amicable patent negotiations with Seddon's Tire representative Mr. Bowden.
- Humorous narrative by 'Peter Pepalpher' about a summer bicycle tour with a Kodak camera: companion Jack outpaces a farmer's milk cart and a brindle cow, the pair shelter at a farmhouse where Jack falls for a berry-picking country girl, and the narrator now wistfully contemplates their framed 'Paul and Virginia' photograph knowing Jack will wed her in spring.